Matlock's System

9

You “see,” said the Abbot, “there is and always has been a basic contradiction in the make-up of our organization. This stems from a contradiction in your Age Laws, Mr. Matlock. When you first propounded the idea, an Expectation of Life of ninety years or thereabouts seemed not unreasonable. But two things have happened. Firstly because of gross mishandling of the nation’s economy after your departure, first by Brother Adeste here…”

The old man stirred in protest but Francis took a step forward and he relapsed into a vicious silence. The Abbot continued unperturbed. “… and then by his successor, Browning, the E.O.L. has dropped steadily year by year for many years until, as we all know, it has at last reached the Bible Barrier. At the same time medical science has not been standing still. There are drugs, techniques, which delay the ageing process considerably. But it seems rather pointless putting these at the disposal of those who are never going to be able to benefit from them.”

“To those that have shall be given. From those who have not…” Matlock trailed away dully.

“Well done, Mr. Matlock. I see the Abbey is having a positive effect on you after all. Turn that monitor down, will you, Francis? I must have a word with Brother Duplex about those arm movements. You’re right, Mr. Matlock. He’s developing a style of his own. Well, to continue. The contradiction present in our set-up has always been that the old guard was being preserved with the connivance of the new, who looked forward to similar preservation when their time came. And there has through history never been any love lost between the old guard and the new.

“But this state of things would have continued quite happily, were places such as this merely hermitages where the worthy old could live out their last few years in peace.”

“Places?” interjected Matlock. “Plural?”

“Oh yes. That’s one of the results of the contradiction you see. We had to expand. But more of that in a moment. No, the real trouble was that because the E.O.L. in law got less and less while the E.O.L. in medical terms got more and more, our customers started arriving here with upwards of quarter of a century of life still before them. Look at Brother Adeste here. He should by the estimates of twenty or thirty years ago be at best a bed-ridden dotard, more likely a worm-eaten corpse. But he’s still hale and hearty, apart from some interesting contusions round the throat. The outcome of these changes in circumstance was twofold. Firstly over-crowding. We started getting too many because the oldest weren’t dying. And our customers began to grow discontented. These are men not used to anonymity, to sitting back without influence while others wield the reins of government.”

He paused and pursed his lips as though in private amusement.

“And?” prompted Matlock, eager to hear the rest now. Whatever the future held, he had decided, he must play his part, big or small, in full possession of all the facts.

“We solved the first problem by developing other centres on similar though less magnificent lines. Lindisfarne on Holy Island, Lanercost in Cumberland. Our neighbour Bolton. Of course this made the problem of keeping the secret more acute. Not that we feared anything from the ultimate if anything got out, but local authorities and newspapers might have been able to do a great deal of damage before the muzzle was applied. As it is we have come under a certain amount of suspicion, but never any direct accusation. Or at least none that was published.

“So far so good. But I had noticed in my dealing with the Prime Minister in recent years a growing uneasiness with the situation. While the thought of another thirty years of life appealed greatly to him, the prospect of passing it certainly in obscurity, probably in constant danger of discovery, and most unbearable of all, in the company of men who had been his unrespected superiors for most of his working life, did not appeal at all.

“Meanwhile back at the Abbey Brother Adeste and others began to fret at the bit. They have attempted to assume some kind of vicarious power with me as their plenipotentiary to the P.M., but Browning was having none of that. So more positive methods were sought. Power is a drug of strange potency, Mr. Matlock, as I am sure, you know.”

“I have lost the taste for it Abbot,” said Matlock.

“Nonsense. You are drinking in every word I say in the hope that you might be able to use it against me. Or someone. And so you may.

“Well now, at this point in time some two and a half years ago, just when I was beginning to feel the horns of my own personal dilemma pricking very hard — I mean how best to preserve myself in the developing clash between the Hooded Brethren and Browning — a strange and fortuitous event occurred. I was approached, subtly and indirectly, by a member of the Anti-Age-Law movement, your group if you remember, Mr. Matlock. It was the President of the Doncaster Poetry Appreciation Society as a matter of fact, up here allegedly to have a word with Brother Michelangelo, one of our genuinely religious brethren with some claims to being a minor Minor Poet. This man paid a courtesy call on me. I soon realized he was looking for an opportunity to sound me out on certain topics. I encouraged him, gave the kind of answer I saw he wanted, and soon I was being invited to join your conspiracy. A very naive kind of man really. I cannot but feel he deserved his fate, whatever it was.

“At first I was merely amused by the irony of the situation. But soon I began to see in it a kind of insurance against any possible move Browning might make against us. I told Browning I had been approached, of course. He probably knew already. Indeed he might have arranged it. Anyway, he advised me, as I hoped, to join.”

Mixed with his revulsion, Matlock felt a strong sense of relief. This seemed to let Lizzie and Ernst off the hook.

“So it was you who betrayed us,” he half whispered.

“Oh no. Not always. I had to give him a lot of information, of course. But I was only one of a thousand sources. As far as you’re concerned, Mr. Matlock, I have been very tight-lipped. Any information about your activities came from other sources, probably those I have suggested to you already.

“No, I was very interested in making the Anti-A’s a going concern. I found a considerable amount of enthusiasm, often positively militant, among the Unhooded Brothers. People like Brother Phillip for instance. He’s a great fan of yours. Of course they don’t know about Brother Adeste, and the others; I don’t quite know how they’d take that. But they’re tremendously useful as guards and patrols. And of course I have my own picked band of Brothers led by Francis here whose loyalty is to me and me alone. Mercenaries you might call them. But not ungodly men for all that, eh Francis?”

Francis smiled, his eyes still fixed on Carswell who sat still, but taut as a spring, in the great armchair.

“The Hooded Chapter, of course, were kept abreast of events. At least, as much as I thought it good for them to know.”

Carswell moved then, squirming with hate.

“I never trusted you, Abbot.”

“Indeed? Then I’m pleased I never voted for you or your party in my life.

“Well, recently things began to come to a head. I was influential in the movement, you understand, but not its leader. The Scots had been approached, not through me. I was much against it. I have reason to believe they are not very fond of me either.”

“They’re not,” said Matlock, remembering.

“Curious folk, the Celts. You see, what I wanted was not a revolution, but the threat of one. I wanted a gun to point at Browning should he look troublesome. But the gun was now cocked and it had a hair trigger. Matters were out of my hands, the climax was fast approaching. So I looked at my cards, then volunteered to be the one to contact the charismatic Matthew Matlock. You’ll be interested to know, Mr. Matlock, that not even the leaders of this motley gang of revolutionaries knew just how much or little you yourself knew. But you were our unifying factor, our rallying point. Under you, the Anti-A’s could move as one in a way they couldn’t under any other single individual.

“So I wanted you with me. I still couldn’t see which way was best to go. But with you, I had a double chance.”

“You mean, to use me as a figurehead, or to trade me in to Browning?”

“Exactly. But Browning moved too quickly for me. My intelligence service was limited. He squashed the plot and got you. Your value to me was less now, but still worth a risk — your risk — to get hold of. So Francis brought you out and here you are.”

Matlock closed his eyes and was surprised to find he could almost have slept.

Oh Lizzie, Lizzie, he thought, I long for your arms to shelter me from these men who turn me, and turn me, and turn me again, till I face the way they want, but never know which way that is.

“Are you all right?” asked an anxious voice.

He opened his eyes. The Abbot now stood beside him, his face all benevolent anxiety. The oak panels glowed gently in the shifting light of the flames. All seemed well. Even the flickering whiteness of the monitor screen seemed safe, domestic. He shook his head.

“What now, Abbot?” he asked. “Why do you tell us all this? What has happened?”

“Yes, Abbot,” came Carswell’s voice. “I guess you’ve been with Browning these last few days. What have you been up to?”

The Abbot smiled and rested his fingertips together to form a Norman arch.

“True, Brother. I have been negotiating with him. And very amenable I have found him. He doesn’t want trouble at this point in time. His position is precarious enough as it is, though he has made a great deal of political capital out of the uprising that never was. Of course he has not mentioned that its main purpose was to overthrow the Age Laws.

No, he has subtly insinuated that its main purpose was to steal the property of, and rape the wives and daughters of, every good citizen. Fortunately, Mr. Matlock, he still regards you as a person of some importance. In the hands of the Scots, say, you could still guarantee sufficient support in the North to make an invasion feasible. So I have promised to keep you safe and sound.

“I did have to make a couple of concessions, Brother Adeste. One of them involves you, I fear. He fears for your health up here in this bleak place. A man of your age needs what comforts the South and the metropolis can offer him. He has sent a special escort of men with a long history of medical training to accompany you on your journey.”

Carswell stood up, slowly, as if his years had suddenly grown heavy on his shoulders.

“I will not go.”

“You must.”

“I will not. I will not. You bastard. You traitor!”

He turned and ran desperately to the door. Francis’ waiting arms wrapped round him and he kicked for a moment, then hung like a rag doll.

“Are they here, Francis?”

“Outside, Abbot.”

“Good. Give him to them.”

Francis turned and opened the door, Carswell didn’t struggle but turned his head as he was carried through and raised a limp arm towards Matlock.

“Matt,” he said, and again, “Matt.”

Matlock didn’t move. In the lighted square of the door over Carswell’s pathetic white hairs he saw two men, not robed but in suits, their dark-blue ties split down the middle by a thin silver line. One looked him straight in the face for a second, then the door closed behind Francis and they were gone.

“Abbot,” he said.

“I’m sorry about that, Matt — I may call you Matt now, I think — but ...”

“Abbot,” he interrupted. “Those men. Browning’s men. They saw me.”

A shadow crossed the Abbot’s face for a moment, but he then gave a smile.

“I take your point. They know you’re here. But not for long eh? We’ll move you along in a very short while. It’s all laid on. But first, and very important, we mustn’t forget your imminent birthday.”

“Abbot,” said Matlock, “you don’t know Browning as I do. You should do, but you don’t. You can’t. It won’t be hours. It might be minutes. You must stop those men. You must ...”

His protests died as the wall panel at which the Abbot had been fumbling moved away and out of the gap revealed there slid a shining silver machine.

It was a Heart Clock Adjuster.

“Just step over here please, Matt, and we’ll put you on a few years. We have to keep you alive now, don’t we?”

All Matlock’s fears came rushing back.

“It can wait a few moments, Abbot, but those men can’t. Get hold of them, for God’s sake.”

The Abbot hesitated.

“I fear you are exaggerating the dangers, Matt. Of course we don’t want Browning to know your exact whereabouts. But by the time those men make a report, he’ll know you could be anywhere. In any case they will not be allowed to leave without clearance from me.”

“You bloody fool,” screamed Matlock, his own fears suddenly, horribly, hardening to certainty. “Haven’t you seen a wrist-radio? Don’t you think Browning wouldn’t be happy to take this place apart if he thought he could get everyone here at one fell swoop?”

“He wouldn’t dare. We know too much. He wouldn’t dare.”

But the Abbot’s voice was full of uncertainty and suddenly he moved purposefully across to his desk-phone. But before he could touch it, it gave off a high-pitched urgent scream which only stopped when he picked it up.

“Yes,” he snapped, jabbing a button. The picture on the monitor leapt from the Church, where the acting-Abbot was saying the benediction, to the control room in the tower. A worried looking monk peered out towards them.

“Abbot,” he said, “something’s happening out by the gatehouse. We’re trying to get in close-up ...”

He dissolved before their eyes and the screen went blank. A split second later the floor rocked beneath their feet and a huge explosion blasted their ears.

“Dear God,” said the Abbot, white-faced. “Dear God!”

The door burst open and Francis rushed in.

“The tower. They’ve blasted the tower.”

“How, for God’s sake?”

“How should I know? Rockets, I think.”

He was shouldered aside by another monk.

“Abbot,” he cried. “They’re coming in. Helicopters full of men.”

Suddenly he and Francis stiffened together like some ghastly double act, then toppled forward into the room.

The Abbot stood stock still, but Matlock moved forward so quickly that he caught Francis’ gun before the dead monk hit the ground and revealed the smoking hole between his shoulders.

Matlock threw himself out into the corridor his finger pressed hard on the trigger. The speed of the attack surprised the two men who stood outside. One of them went down to the first burst of shots, the other dropped flat and took aim, but there was no time for aim.

Matlock heard the Abbot come out beside him.

“They came back,” he said. “Conscientious perhaps. Or glory-seekers. They came back to do it themselves.”

“We’d better move,” said the Abbot. “This is a bit of a dead end up here.”

He made to move off down the corridor but Matlock’s gun jammed in his belly.

“Don’t forget that,” he said. “I need it.”

The Abbot went back into his study and picked up the Adjuster.

“You’re right. Even if you didn’t need it, it’s worth a million of anything you name. Shall we go now?”

The lift door was open, the lift occupied. It was Carswell.

For a moment Matlock thought the old man was alive but the blank unseeing eyes told him the truth even before the frail corpse slid down the wall against which it had been propped and sprawled across the floor.

“They must have killed him in the lift, radioed their news to Browning’s men, then come straight back up for us.”

The Abbot did not reply but started to drag the body out into the corridor. The Adjuster impeded him and he could only use one hand.

“In the interests of speed, Brother,” he said, “could you help me here?”

Overcoming his distaste, Matlock seized the old man by the shoulders and heaved him out. When he straightened up his hands were tacky with blood.

“No time for obsequies, I’m afraid,” said the Abbot. “Down we go. Do keep that gun ready.”

But there was no need for it below in the cold passageway, dim and shadowy by contrast with the brightness they had left. As yet it was deserted, though the sounds of war were all about — the crackle of guns, the shouting of men, now and then the loud explosion of something more than a hand-gun.

“Where are we heading?” asked Matlock.

The Abbot stood uncertain for a moment, then seemed to make up his mind.

“This way,” he said and they set off at a jog down the passage which led to the Cloister Court.

The Abbot talked breathlessly as he ran.

“Browning won’t stop till he’s razed the Abbey. Now he’s committed himself, he can’t just go halfway. But he’ll want proof we’re dead first. Not just a pile of rubble we might or might not be under.”

He stopped talking to gasp in great lungfuls of air.

Matlock shouted back, “How does that help us?”

The Abbot stopped and leaned up against the wall.

“It doesn’t much. But at least it means they’ll want everybody. There are one or two others he’ll want to be sure are not wandering round the countryside.”

“But his men will recognize people they know should have been dead years ago.”

“So what? That’s exacdy his justification for this attack. The Age-Law evaders revealed. A plot against the country. There is one law for all, rich and poor. Can’t you hear him? This will make him.”

They were almost at the end of the passage where it came out beside the Chapter House. The Abbot peered carefully out into the Cloister Square, now no longer dark but fitfully lit by flashes of light from the fighting which seemed to be centred in the adjacent Church. Overhead swung helicopters and their searchlight beams swept across the Square and up and down the whole complex of Abbey buildings. Even as they watched, the dazzling light poured down on to the close-mown grass and transfixed there three monks. They turned to run, one tripped over his robes and, falling, clutched at another. A gun chattered above them and they both lay still. The third disappeared into the protecting shadow of the cloister walk.

The light moved away.

“Come,” said the Abbot.

They slid round out of the passage and into the Chapter House. Unhesitating, the Abbot moved among the marble pillars till he came to the tomb of John de Cancia. Matlock stood and watched, still trying to accustom his eyes to the new darkness.

“Help me,” hissed the Abbot. He was fiddling at one corner of the marble slab, and now he began to pull.

Matlock knelt beside him and added his weight, still ignorant of what they were doing. Slowly at first, then smoothly and easily; the marble moved, and Matlock found himself peering into a dark uninviting hole.

“Ah,” said the Abbot with satisfaction. “There we are. These places were often fitted with tunnels for various purposes. This one is very old and runs to How Hill, a mile to the south. I merely had it extended to open up here. Who wants to enter the tomb, after all?”

“Ingenious,” said Matlock. “Shall we go?”

There was a sound behind him. He spun round, gun at the ready, but hesitated when he saw the figure who had so stealthily approached was a monk.

“Thank God I’ve found you, Abbot,” gasped the man. He moved forward so that his face was visible. It was the Abbot.

“Ah, Brother Duplex,” murmured the real Abbot. “How clever of you to know about this. You made more use of our rehearsals than I thought. What’s happening out there?”

“They’re massacring us. We’re out-numbered both in men and firepower. Brother Phillip’s organized what defence he can, but it can’t last long. We must hurry.”

“Indeed we must,” said the Abbot. “Brother, I see you are well armed. I have nothing, let me have a gun.”

He reached out his hand. Matlock saw that he was right. Duplex must have paused long enough at some arms cache to grab a couple of hand-guns and a belt of grenades. The monk now thrust one of the guns into the Abbot’s hand and turned to the tomb.

The Abbot spoke.

“When doppel-gängers meet, one must die,” he said, and shot Duplex twice in the back.

“Now Brother Matt,” he said turning, “look not so disapproving. It suits me very well to have my body found by Browning’s soldiers. And two’s company they say. Come.”

He stooped to pick up the Adjuster. Over his bent back, Matlock saw Duplex half turn on his left elbow, his right hand plucking at his grenade belt. Matlock brought his gun up, but the Abbot rose at that moment blocking his aim. He thrust him aside and fired, but the lost second had been crucial. From Duplex’s nerveless fingers rolled a primed grenade. A whole pack of wild thoughts ran madly through Matlock’s mind. Lizzie, Colin, Ernst, Edna, Carswell, his parents, all rose before him and reached to him and tried to talk to him. But like Ulysses in the underworld, he knew these phantoms needed blood before they could speak. And in his mind he stood and wept silently, futilely before their dreadful pleas.

But his body moved independently. Two strides forward, the grenade scooped up, arm thrown back and the metal egg hurled into the one place which offered them any escape from its blast.

The tomb.

He lay on the ground till the ground stayed still and the stones stopped falling about him. Then he rose.

“Abbot,” he whispered, his eyes still dazzled by the flash, “are you all right?”

But the Abbot was up already and peering down into the tunnel.

“You bloody fool! It’s blocked. We can’t get through. You stupid ...”

His voice trailed away as he saw Matlock’s face.

“Yes of course. There was nothing else to do. Of course. Well, lead on. It’s up to you now. Your quick thinking saved our lives. Let’s see if your quick thinking can save us from the results of your quick thinking.”

“What about the river?”

“The river? Yes, the river perhaps. Perhaps.”

Matlock hit the Abbot in the face with the flat of his hand.

“Wake up, Abbot. Despair is the sin against the Holy Ghost, isn’t it? How do we get to the river without going outside?”

The Abbot stood in silence for a while. Whether in thought or in shock, Matlock didn’t know. But finally he said, “The Cellarium. That is built over the river. We can get at it through the Cellarium.”

Outside in the Court they could still hear the sound of the battle raging in the Church. But they crossed without incident and cautiously entered the long, cool vaults of the Cellarium. In there it was absolutely quiet and even the sounds of fighting outside seemed distant and disconnected.

Matlock was now leading, the Abbot close behind. He had discarded his gun and was clutching the Adjuster with both hands, whether for reassurance or because his strength was failing, Matlock didn’t know. But he knew he was worried about the Abbot whose will seemed to have suddenly bent, if not broken, under the strain. Matlock wondered again how old he was, who he was, or rather, had been to be given this job.

Perhaps it was these thoughts which distracted him. Certainly he thought later, he should have been aware a couple of steps earlier that they were not alone in the cellar. Even then, he was so keyed up to action that as the two darker patches detached themselves from the wall ahead he was moving sideways.

The beam of light caught his face, he shot at it and heard a hoarse cry. Then something struck the wall about three inches from his head, a sliver of fine stone raced across his brow and he fell.

It felt like hours, but his unconsciousness must have lasted only a couple of seconds. When his eyes opened again, it was to see a strange nightmarish tableau. In the middle of the great stone floor, bathed in torch light, knelt the Abbot. Approaching him with gun in one hand and torch in the other was a young soldier, a boy of about twenty. Matlock could see the pallor of his face in the light reflected back from the silvery metal face of the Adjuster which the Abbot still clutched to his chest.

The Abbot’s face was working as though something lived under the skin. His lips moved, but no words came. Matlock began to feel around carefully for his fallen gun. The boy was standing right over the Abbot now, his face taut with fear — or disgust.

Suddenly the Abbot thrust the Adjuster up at him.

“Take it! Take it!” he screamed. “You can live for ever. For ever. Take it!”

Whether the boy thought the machine was a weapon, or whether he knew what it was and acted in hysterical disgust, Matlock didn’t know. But he jerked back a step, then began to pump bullets through the machine into the Abbot’s body.

The Abbot remained kneeling for a long time. He hissed through his pale lips. “Life, life,” a couple of times, the Adjuster fell apart in his hands, then he collapsed forward.

Matlock rolled over and tried to push himself up. His hand touched the still hot barrel of his gun. Clumsily, noisily, he shifted his grip to the butt. He needn’t have worried — the boy stood stock still over the Abbot’s body and heard nothing. He didn’t even move when Matlock, his head still dizzy with pain, missed with his first shot.

His second tore the boy’s chest open, and the third removed the terrified face.

Staggering to his feet, Matlock made his way over to the Abbot and turned his body over. Amazingly he was not yet dead. Words bubbled redly from his lips.

“… too young to bribe with age, Matt… too young.”

Then he was dead.

Matlock spared a few moments to look at the shattered Adjuster. It was obviously beyond repair. It was five days to his birthday.

He ran his hand over his forehead in perplexity and found it thick with blood. He must have looked very dead.

Bending over the soldier he went swiftly through his small pack till he came across the field dressing he was looking for. He had no time for refinement but drew a smear of antiseptic cream across his brow and wrapped a bandage round twice.

All the while his mind raced on.

Was it worth it? Even if he escaped it meant only a few days of uncomfortable, frightened, waiting freedom. Wouldn’t it be better to go out now with a gun and die fighting the enemy.

What would that do? Kill a few boys like this?

He looked at the faceless youth at his feet.

Better surely to look for someone worthy of death. Perhaps in four days he could find Browning. Perhaps in five days…

Perhaps I’d just rather die in five days than five minutes, he told himself and the admission made him feel almost light-hearted.

He turned and headed back up the Cellarium. The river was still his best bet, he felt, but without the Abbot’s guidance, he decided it would be easier to get out of the Abbey buildings altogether and take his chance in the open.

His first thought was to make his way out of the door through which he had entered the Abbey buildings earlier that night. The thought went through his mind that if he had stopped quietly in bed, Browning’s men could not have been certain he was in the Abbey that night and the attack might not have taken place.

But he found that a small profitable side-effect of his sense of being a pawn in someone else’s game was a dilution of self-reproach, and the thought was pushed completely from his mind when he reached the outer door and peered through.

The Strangers’ House was a roaring inferno around which the black outlines of men scuttled like insects on a burning log. The greensward between the House and the Abbey was as bright as day, if daylight could properly be likened to this red and white fury.

Exit from this door was impossible. Matlock felt the beginnings of despair and suddenly four days seemed a lifetime to lose. He began to make his way back, looking for refuge in the dark shadows of the great building. But now a new and stranger horror began to pursue him. For the darkness around him suddenly brightened, began to redden, to tremble, to dissolve as though it was being burnt away.

He spun round. The great wall behind him seemed to be full of a terrible flame and his mind began to spiral to some safe insanity of terror as he watched. Brighter and brighter it grew. Then as he turned to run, the truth flashed on him, still stimulus to terror but not to madness.

A glance back confirmed his guess. The flame was the glow of the raging bonfire which had been the Strangers’ House. He was seeing it through the wall, more clearly each second.

The wall was made of poro-glass and someone had operated the transparency control. And even as he ran, the implications of what he had seen leapt eagerly into his mind.

The whole reconstruction of the Abbey must have been done in poro-glass, a type so refined that it was possible to create the exact colour of old stone in it. He was trying to escape like a rat running through a glass maze.

As he ran, the walls about and behind him misted greyly then cleared to perfect transparency. Searchlights, flames, even the thin sliver of moon which had edged into the crowded sky, all shone through the clearing roof and walls as though aiming their beams at him. He tried desperately to recollect from those childhood memories of the Abbey ruins which walls had been intact, which walls he could hide behind without fearing that they would turn into a sheet of glass.

For the moment he seemed to have outdistanced the transformation process. He thanked heaven it was based on a slow chain reaction and was therefore gradual not instantaneous. He had lost his bearings in his panic and now he stopped to find out where he was. A little thought told him he was back in the Cloister Passage. Up ahead must be the Infirmary, but that he was certain was part of the reconstruction and must be avoided. He leaned back against the wall and tried to calm his turbulent thoughts.

Without warning he was bathed in hard white light. Turning he saw that the wall on which he was leaning had become transparent, but the other side must have been in utter darkness and he had no warning. Now there was a little group of soldiers there with two or three high-radiancy torches. They stood and stared at him through the wall for a moment, then one of them came so close that his nose touched the glass and for a second he looked like a small boy with his face pressed against a sweetshop window.

Matlock saw a look of excitement cross his face, then he turned to the others and his mouth opened and shut in silent agitation. The others all came forward then and peered closely at him.

Matlock knew he had been recognized. It was eerie to stand there and see these men within a yard of him, silently plotting his death. One of them brought his gun up and pointed it at the wall, but another said something sharply and the gun was lowered.

Matlock smiled. With hand weapons they were more likely to damage themselves than him by firing pointblank at a three foot-thick poro-glass wall.

He began to walk slowly, almost casually along the corridor in the direction of the Infirmary. The soldiers kept pace with him, one of them speaking excitedly into a wrist-radio.

The wall to his right was still a wall. Real or poro-glass he did not know, but at the moment it was beautifully opaque.

He prayed silently that there would be a door in it. At the end of the passage would be the Infirmary which must by now be as bright as day.

When the door appeared, he almost believed in God. Then he entered and found himself in a small windowless store-room with no other exit, and his new-formed faith crumbled.

He glanced around looking hopelessly for something that might help him. The room seemed to be some kind of medical store-room and it was full of crates and bottles. Leaning against the far wall was a row of gas cylinders. There seemed to be two types. Matlock was not expert enough to decipher the markings on them but one of them he was certain must be oxygen. And the other…

Swiftly he moved along the row, turning each tap full on. Then he bent and picked up a bottle he had noticed by the door. Phosphorus. Memories of chemistry lessons in the old smelly laboratory at school more than half a century before came back to him.

He eased the stopper half out and turned the bottle on its side. The liquid in it began to ebb out. Carefully he propped it up against the wall so that its mouth pointed to the floor at an angle of forty-five degrees.

Then he stepped back into the corridor and pulled the door shut behind him.

Looks of relief appeared on the faces of the men opposite. They too must have been praying that there was no other exit.

“A simple example of the democratic nature of prayer,” said Matlock to the unhearing men, and moved slowly away along the passage. After fifteen paces he stopped. This ought to be safe enough. He sat down and made himself as small as possible. Back in the store-room he imagined the gas hissing out of the cylinders and the insulating liquid dripping out of the phosphorus bottle. And he wondered how long it would be before the other soldiers got round to him. He was surprised that they had taken so long. He could only surmise that Brother Phillip was keeping them occupied with a hard rearguard action.

Distantly he heard the sound of trotting feet. Booted feet.

He didn’t bother to get up but glanced back the way he’d come. Within seconds he saw them, four soldiers and an officer moving towards him at the double, guns ready. He wondered dismally whether they had been told to capture him or kill him on sight.

Then as they passed the store-room door, there was a small bang, followed immediately by a vast explosion. The door was hurled from its hinges squashing two of the soldiers flat against the poroglass. A great tongue of flame licked out into the corridor bearing with it chunks of store-room wall. Protected though they were, the men opposite flung their arms before their faces in horror and fear.

Matlock rose slowly and without looking at them moved carefully back through the smoke to what had been the storeroom. One of the soldiers was still moving. He shot him as an act of mercy and taking a deep breath, he plunged into the smoke and reek of the room, stepped through a wall of flame, thought for one horrified moment that the wall had not been breached, then felt the cool night air on his face.

A minute later he was being carried by the river underneath the Infirmary and out into the inviting darkness beyond.

Looking back later, he realized what risks he took then. But somehow the river had been identified with safety and escape, and once in it, a trance-like confidence came over him. He made no effort at concealment when he clambered out, but strode openly across the grass, even pausing to look back at the red glow which was all he could see now of the Abbey. He supposed that similar scenes must have taken place at the other centres mentioned by the Abbot.

Browning’s dissolution of the monasteries, he thought almost jauntily as he struck across country.

An hour later he was wandering through the outer streets of Ripon. It seemed as if his luck was going to hold.

Then minutes later he was sucked into the cavernous depths of a Curfew Wagon.